Children's Nightly Problems
by KodiakWolfe13
Summary: Kids wake their parents up in the middle of the night for all sorts of things. Bruce knows this all too well... (One-Shot.)(Part 1 of the "Oh Boys..." Series)


**Disclaimer: Still own nothing but my ideas.**

* * *

 _Dick (9 Years Old)_

* * *

When Bruce had finally gone to bed in the early morning hours, he expected Alfred to wake him up sometime the next morning when the sun was starting to peek up from the horizon, as was per usual. He had not expected, however, that he would be woken up before then by a much smaller figure shaking his shoulder as he kneeled beside his bedside.

The Dark Knight stirred from his deep slumber as the second person shook him. He inhaled deeply, blearily looking around the dark room with his blue eyes. They worked quickly to adjust the little-to-no lighting but the orbs were able to easily make out the black silhouette of a small head beside his bedside. Squinting his eyes, Bruce asked "Dick? Is that you?"

The small figure beside him nodded his head. It was hard to see since it was so dark but Bruce's eyes were slowly starting to make out small details on the boy's face, confirming his hypothesis on who the small person was. What he was doing waking his mentor up in the middle of the night was a whole different mystery he was going to have to delve into.

"What are you doing up, Dick?" Bruce asked tiredly, rubbing even more sleep from his eyes as he started shifting around. He was still breathing heavily, as people did when they slept, but it was slowly becoming easier and shallower the longer he was up.

There was a small sniff from Dick beside Bruce, making him tense and fear the worst. He wondered if the cause of his protégé's unhappiness was due to reoccurring nightmares of his parents' death or if he had managed to hurt himself while trying to sneak a midnight snack. Both had been problems over the past few months, especially the former of the two.

Bruce reached out and placed a hand on Dick's shoulders, face scrunching up in concern at the younger's obvious unrest. "Hey, what's wrong, Chum? Is something bothering you?"

Dick sniffed again and nodded. He whined "I have buyer's remorse!"

…

…say _what now_?!

Bruce scoffed quietly in a 'you've-got-to-be-kidding-me' way as tightened his grip on Dick's shoulder ever so slightly to fight the desire to face-palm. His head dropped back to the pillow and he moaned into it for being woken up for something as simple as _buyer's remorse_.

Dick made a small sobbing noise and shook Bruce by the shoulder again as the Dark Knight's hand dropped from his shoulder to dangle helplessly off the side of the bed. "Bruce, come on! This is _serious_!"

The day before, Dick had tagged along with Alfred on one of his weekly shopping trips. At one of the stores, Dick had bought a husky stuffed animal with his allowance money. Bruce had heard later that night from Alfred that the nine-year-old had had a hard time deciding between the husky and a different plushy of a white tiger.

Obviously, Dick had been thinking about his decision a little too much during the night…

"Dick, go to bed. We can deal with this in the morning…" Bruce whined, wrapping his arms around his plush pillow and burying his head into it as Dick continued to shake his shoulder while crying over his poor, _poor_ decision.

"But _Bruce_ ~! What if the tiger isn't there the next time Alfred goes shopping?!"

"It'll be there, Dick. A lot of other kids want white tigers too. They'll keep making more. Don't worry."

"But what if all the other kids get them before me~?!"

" _It will be there_. _Trust me_."

" _But Bruce~!_ "

"If you go to bed now, I'll take you tomorrow and we'll get it for you, ok?!"

"Ok!"

Dick happily scampered out of the bedroom with Bruce's soothing words echoing in his brain.

The Dark Knight moaned again and buried his head further into his pillow, completely and utterly defeated for the night. "Why me?"

* * *

 _Jason (12 Years Old)_

* * *

Bruce was sleeping quite soundly in his bed for the first time in a week, having been too worried about Joker's recent escape to do much resting. Now that the crazed lunatic was tightly locked away in Arkham again, the Dark Knight of Gotham City could rest, knowing he had done his job. Whatever problem he would face the next day would be dealt with once he got a good night's rest.

As the remnants of a dream that would soon be long forgotten, Bruce was startled awake when something heavy landed on top of him roughly, drawing all the breath from his lungs and making his spine ache.

"Hey Bruce, I need to talk to you about something!"

…make that _if_ he got a good night's rest….

Sighing in tiredness and absolute exasperation, Bruce looked over his shoulder to look at the preteen sitting on his back. From the tone of voice Jason was using, nothing serious had happened and whatever he was about to say could obviously wait until morning. However, that was _not_ the way of "Jason fucking Todd", as the boy liked to call himself.

"And what do you need to talk about, Jay?" Bruce asked expectantly, tired eyes drooping. Maybe the dull noise of the preteen's talking would lull him back to sleep. It's not like the boy was here for anything important.

There was a pleased sound from the boy above him before he began talking at a speed Flash would appreciate. "So-I-had-a-dream-a-little-while-ago-and-it-was-basically-a-Godzilla-army-with-smaller-versions-of-Godzilla-and-they-were-destroying-Gotham-and-you-were-eating-ice-cream-and-I-was-running-around-and-Dick-was-being-a-dick-to-old-ladies-and-"

"Where are you going with this?" Bruce interrupted, looking over his shoulder at the boy and glaring with his tired, irritated blue eyes.

Jason continued grinning from his seat on top of Bruce. "Well-Dick-told-me-that-dreams-usually-have-meanings-behind-them-and-since-you're-Batman-I-thought-you-would-know-since-you're-just-a-wealth-of-useless-knowledge-and-do-you-know-why-I-would-dream-up-a-Godzilla-army-with-you-eating-ice-cream-me-running-and-Dick-being-a-dick?"

"…go away, Jason."

The preteen laughed, calming down his racing mouth. "Come on, Bruce! This is one of the few things that have interested me! Use your detective skills or whatever the hell it is you use and answer my question already! I'm curious~!"

"Can't we do this in the morning?"

"NO! I'll forget my dream by then! I want my question answered now~!"

"Oh, if you're worrying about forgetting, trust me. That's a dream you won't forget. As a matter of fact, neither will I. Now go to bed, sleep, and dream something new for all I care…"

"Bruce, answer my question~! You're already up!"

"Fine! You're psychotic and you have skewed opinions about the people around you! Now go. To. Bed."

"Why do I have to if you haven't answered my question properly? And it's not like you're doing anything important like shaking the bed with Catwoman or- AHHHH!"

 _Thump!_

"Jason, _go to bed_!"

The preteen cackled from his spot on the ground before racing from the room, escaping Bruce's wrath as he rolled over and groaned. "What did I do to deserve _that_?"

* * *

 _Tim (11 Years Old)_

* * *

As Bruce awoke from his slumber unhappily, he wondered who would be waking him up in the dead of night. It's not like any kids were living with him at the time, though he did have a Robin fighting by his side again, and Alfred wasn't the type of person to wake people up in the middle of the night for anything if he could handle it himself.

Then Bruce remembered… Tim was staying with him for the week while his dad traveled. So yes, he technically _did_ have kids living with him for the time being.

The Dark Knight turned his head to the side, dragging it from the depths of the pillow, and squinted against the harsh light coming from Tim's flashlight. As Bruce's blue eyes adjusted against the light illuminating the boy's terrified face, any irritation he had for being woken up in the middle of the night evaporated into concern. "Tim, what's the matter?"

"Um…" The ebony-haired boy started, rubbing his arm nervously as he shined the flashlight around the room. "Well… I'm scared."

"Of?"

" _It._ "

Bruce's face scrunched up in confusion. " _What?_ "

Tim crawled up beside the tired, ebony-haired man, making sure to tuck his feet under him and away from the edge of the bed. "You know! It's that clown-thing in the Stephan King book! It's _It_!"

"Oh my gosh!" Bruce whined, stuffing his face back into his pillow and mimicking sobbing noises. The kid beside him could face off against the scariest Gotham villains without so much as flinching but he reads about one horror book and he's terrified. "Tim, you _know_ it's not real! It's just a book!"

"…and a movie…"

"You watched the movie?!"

"I didn't mean to!"

"How do you _not mean_ to watch a movie?!"

"Skill..?"

"…"

"…you want me to go back to bed now?"

"Uh-huh."

…

" _Now_ Tim!"

Tim squeaked before taking off, rushing from the room as fast as he could go. He left his flashlight sitting on the edge of Bruce's bed, getting him to yell after the child about the forgotten device but Tim wasn't coming back for nothing. After sighing, turning off the flashlight, and chucking it away, Bruce began getting comfortable all over again.

* * *

 _Damian (10 Years Old)_

* * *

As Bruce was shaken around by his first biological son, he stirred but stayed mostly asleep as he turned his head and mumbled a question. Having three other boys before Damian had enabled him to start sleeping through their stupid reasons for waking him up. When he was fully conscious, he usually found it ridiculous it took three boys to train him in such a way before he switched his embarrassed mind to something else.

Since his eyes were closed, Bruce did not see the glare he was receiving from the boy standing above him and shaking his shoulder. Damian was not thrilled that his father was sleeping through his pestering and vowed to beat the others for training Bruce to react in such a way. _He_ was important. The others were _not_. "Father, I need to talk to you."

"Doesn't everybody who wanders into my room in the middle of the night?" Bruce muttered, still not having opened his eyes. Some part of him told his brain that Damian was not going to be happy with him paying little attention but sleep was calling to him still. It had been a rough night and that's all he wanted.

Damian's fingers drummed against his arm as he continued glaring and scowling at the tired Dark Knight. "Titus met a female Great Dane at the dog park today. They're going to have puppies."

Now _that_ woke Bruce up.

The Dark Knight shot up and looked at the ten-year-old who was still not amused. " _What?! Are you serious?_ "

"No. You weren't listening. I was trying to wake you up. It worked." Damian stated bluntly, smirking darkly at his father who was now glaring at him heatedly for doing something so notorious to him. "Now, about why I'm here?"

"What do you want?" The Dark Knight seethed, staying perfectly still to see if being woken up was worth it.

Damian shrugged. "It's four. We're usually getting ready to spar right now. I was wondering why you weren't getting up."

Bruce silently asked the Lord if it was ok to die right then and there. His surroundings didn't turn into a bunch of bright clouds so he assumed that was a blatant 'no' from above so he settled for moaning and collapsing onto his mattress again. "Damian, we worked till two. Go to bed and get some rest."

"What about sparring?"

"We can spar later! Go to bed!"

"But I'm not tired."

Bruce screamed into his pillow before grabbing Damian's shoulder. "Any other ten-year-old would be thrilled to be told to go back to bed. Be a normal ten-year-old for a little while and _go back to bed_!"

"But we're not normal."

" _Damian!_ "

"T-t…" Damian muttered, rolling his eyes. He began moving towards the door, saying "Alright, fine. I will comply this one time."

"Thank God…" Bruce mumbled, hugging his pillow. He heard Damian leave, sighed, and did a little self-pity whine. "That's it. No more kids. I can't do this anymore. Damian's the last. I promise."

"Grayson said that's what you said when he was a kid so-"

" _DAMIAN! BED!_ "

* * *

 **Poor Bruce just can't catch a break, can he? XD And come on, we've all woken our parents up for something stupid at one point. We're all terrible people for that exact reason (I kid, I kid)!**


End file.
